The Rudolf Steiner Archive

Second Lecture

[ 1 ] This series of lectures will focus in particular on examining the wisdom of the Eastern world—that is, the ancient wisdom of humanity as a whole—in such a way that it is illuminated by the light kindled through the knowledge of the Christ impulse and through the knowledge of all that has gradually developed in the Western world over the centuries as wisdom arising from this Christ impulse. If spiritual science is to be a living discipline, it cannot consist of taking views and opinions about the higher worlds that already exist within humanity—views drawn from history—and then teaching them; rather, it must be a matter of making everything we can experience in the present regarding the nature of the higher worlds the object of our contemplation. ^{1It is evident that I have never presented spiritual science as a borrowing of historically transmitted views, but rather as knowledge to be attained directly in the present. The reason why the terminology of earlier times is sometimes used is that modern times, which are far removed from spiritual scientific knowledge, do not possess such terminology, and it is still easier to be understood through the old terminology than through one that is freely invented.} People who are able to turn their gaze upward into the spiritual worlds and to look upon them just as a person otherwise looks at the outer world with their physical eyes, just as they comprehend the outer world with their intellect—such people have not only existed in ancient times; they have existed at all stages of human development, and they exist even today; and at no time is humanity dependent on teaching and considering only truths handed down through history; nor is humanity dependent on receiving these teachings about the higher worlds from any particular physical location. The source of higher wisdom and higher knowledge can flow anywhere in the world. Just as it would be unreasonable for us to teach mathematics or geography in our schools today based solely on ancient texts written in times past, so too is it unreasonable, when it comes to the great wisdom of the supersensible worlds, to consider only what is historical, only what is of the past. It will therefore be our task in this lecture series to approach the realities of the higher worlds and the beings of the supersensible realms themselves, to allow the familiar, the less familiar, and the entirely unfamiliar to come before our souls—as they appear in the higher worlds—and then to ask ourselves: What did people in earlier times, the people of antiquity, have to say about these matters? In other words: let us allow Western wisdom to come before our soul and then ask ourselves: How does that which we can recognize as Western wisdom harmonize with that which can become known to us as Eastern wisdom? The point at issue is that the wisdom of the supersensible worlds can be understood by every human being through reason, provided it is explained to them. I have often emphasized this: understanding and grasping the facts of the higher worlds requires only an unbiased rationality. Even if this unbiased rationality is a very rare ability in the present day, it does exist; and anyone who wishes to exercise it can understand everything that is reported about the findings of so-called clairvoyant science. However, these facts of the higher worlds can be discovered and investigated only through so-called clairvoyant research, only through the ascent into these higher worlds by people who prepare themselves for it. Since these higher worlds are inhabited by beings whom we can call spiritual in relation to us humans, the exploration of the higher worlds is, in a certain sense, an interaction between the clairvoyant or the initiate and these spiritual beings. Thus, what exists in the higher worlds can be explored only when the clairvoyant ^{2As can be seen, the term “clairvoyant” here does not refer to what is commonly called a dreamlike-pathological state, but rather to a state of knowledge attainable with full composure, in which the soul is in a condition that corresponds entirely to that of mathematical imagination. It is precisely the opposite of the dreamlike-pathological state.} ascends the stages that lead him to communion with a spiritual world.

[ 2 ] Much has already been said about these matters to all of you in one lecture series or another; today, let us bring the essential points to the forefront of our minds. What is first and foremost necessary for a person on the path to clairvoyance to ascend into the higher worlds is nothing less than the ability to see, to recognize, and to experience without the aid of the external senses— that is, without the aid of those instruments that are built into our bodies as eyes, ears, and so on, but also without that instrument which serves, in particular, our intellect and our understanding. Just as one cannot perceive the supersensible worlds with the physical eyes, nor can one hear in them with the physical ears; likewise, one cannot recognize anything about them through the mind, insofar as it is bound to the instrument of the physical brain. Human beings must therefore free themselves from the activity they engage in while making use of their physical senses and their physical brain.

[ 3 ] By now you all know that in normal human life there is a state in which a person is outside the instruments of their physical body; it is the state of sleep. We know that of the four members of human nature—the physical body, the etheric body, the astral body, and the “I”—the last two members, the “I” and the astral body, attain a certain degree of independence.^{3These terms are used here only in the sense explained in my books. Of course, they cannot be criticized from a perspective that associates them with entirely different concepts (such as those of trivial mysticism), as so often happens.} During waking hours, the physical body, the etheric body, the astral body, and the “I” are intimately connected with one another. During sleep, these four members are separated in such a way that, on one side, the physical body and the etheric body remain in bed, while on the other side, the astral body and the “I” live freely in another world. Thus, in the normal course of his life, a person finds himself every twenty-four hours in a state where he does not possess the instruments built into his physical body; but in a certain sense, he must pay for this liberation from the physical body with a darkness of consciousness; during sleep, he sees nothing of the world around him in which he then finds himself.

[ 4 ] Now, the organs that a person needs when he wishes to look into the spiritual world—where he is with his I and astral body during the night—can, of course, only be incorporated into the astral body, or rather into the I. And the difference between the so-called normal person of today and the clairvoyant researcher is none other than this: in the evening, when the “I” and the astral body detach themselves from the physical body and the etheric body, in the normal person the astral body and the “I” are, in a certain sense, unorganized, lacking organs for seeing; whereas in the clairvoyant researcher, such organs—albeit of a different kind—are developed within this astral body, or rather within the “I,” just as the eyes and ears are for the physical body. It is therefore the first task that must be undertaken by anyone who wishes to become a clairvoyant researcher: to do everything necessary to build spiritual eyes, spiritual ears, and so on into their astral body—which is initially undifferentiated—or into their “I.”

[ 5 ] But that is not the only thing that is necessary. Let us suppose that someone had managed, through the means we will briefly mention later, to endow his astral body and his “I” with spiritual eyes, spiritual ears, and so on; he would then have an astral body different from that of a normal human being; he would have a structured, organized astral body. However, he would still not be able to see anything in the spiritual world; at least, he would not be able to attain certain levels of vision. Something else is necessary for that. If, under present-day conditions, a person truly wishes to ascend to clairvoyance—to conscious clairvoyance— it is necessary not only that the spiritual eyes and spiritual ears be developed in his astral body, but also that everything that is thus plastically formed in this astral body be imprinted in the etheric body, just as a seal is imprinted in sealing wax. True conscious clairvoyance begins when the organs—that is, the spiritual eyes, the spiritual ears, and so on—which are developed in the astral body, are imprinted upon the etheric body.

[ 6 ] Thus, the etheric body must assist the astral body and the “I” if clairvoyance is to develop, that is to say, all the members of the human nature—the I, the astral body, and the etheric body—must work together, with the sole exception of the physical body; yet even the physical body, after experiencing the supersensible world, has the task of bringing this knowledge into full harmony with the sensory-rational knowledge acquired through it.

[ 7 ] Now, the etheric body faces a greater obstacle to its work than the astral body does. After all, over the course of twenty-four hours, the astral body and the “I” are always—one might say—in the fortunate position of being free from the physical body. As long as they are confined within the physical body—from the morning, when a person wakes up, until the evening, when a person falls asleep—the astral body and the “I” are bound to the forces of this physical body; and these forces prevent the astral body and the “I” from developing their own organs. The astral body and the “I” are subtle spiritual-soul entities; through their own elasticity, so to speak, they follow the forces of the physical body and take on its form. Therefore, even at night, the normal human being still carries within them the aftereffects of these forces of the physical body; and, as we shall hear, it is only through special measures that one can free the astral body and the “I” from the aftereffects of the physical body, so that this astral body can develop its own form—that is, its spiritual eyes, its spiritual ears, and so on. But one is at least in the fortunate position of having the astral body free over the course of twenty-four hours; one thus has the opportunity to act upon this astral body without further ado, so that it does not continue to follow the elasticity of the physical body during the night, but rather follows its own elasticity.

[ 8 ] The preparatory exercises undertaken by the clairvoyant researcher essentially consist of performing mental activities during waking hours that affect the astral body and the “I” in such a way that when they leave the physical body and the etheric body upon falling asleep, they remain under the influence of what the person has done as special preparation for clairvoyant research.

[ 9 ] Let us therefore consider two cases: the ordinary person as he is in everyday life, who from morning to evening surrenders to the impressions of the external world, surrendering to whatever affects his external senses and intellect. He falls asleep in the evening; his astral body leaves his physical body. This astral body is then entirely absorbed in what has been experienced during the day; it follows the flexibility of the physical body, not its own. It is quite another matter, however, when a person, through meditation, concentration, and other exercises undertaken for the sake of higher knowledge, experiences powerful effects on his soul—that is, on his astral body and I—during his daily life; when, in other words, he sets aside certain times during which he withdraws from ordinary daily life and does something entirely different from what he does in ordinary daily life; when, during these specific times, he does not devote himself to what the external world can convey to his senses and intellect, but rather devotes himself to what is a message and a product of the spiritual worlds. Thus, when he devotes even a brief portion of his waking life to meditation, concentration, and other exercises, this affects his soul in such a way that at night, when his astral body steps out of the physical body, it experiences the effects of this meditation, concentration, and so on—and thereby follows different patterns of flexibility than those of the physical body. The methods for attaining clairvoyant perception therefore consist in the teachers of this discipline applying all the knowledge that has been tested over millennia of human life through exercises, meditations, and concentrations that must be performed during waking hours so that they may then have their aftereffects in nighttime life, causing the astral body to reorganize itself.

[ 10 ] This is the great responsibility assumed by anyone who prescribes such exercises to their fellow human beings. Such exercises are not pulled out of thin air; they are the result of precise spiritual work. It is known that what these exercises prescribe has such an effect on the soul that when this soul steps out of the physical body in the evening as it falls asleep, it develops its spiritual eyes, its spiritual ears, and its spiritual thinking in the proper way. If something is done incorrectly—if the wrong exercises are performed—then of course this also has an effect; then the effects do not fail to occur, but absurd—if we wish to use an expression from the sensory world—unnatural forms are built into the astral body. What does this mean: unnatural forms are built into the astral body? Forms are built in that contradict the great whole of the world. It would then be exactly as if organs were built into our physical body that could not hear external sounds or see external light in the proper way—organs that would not be in harmony with the external world. Through incorrect meditation and concentration, a person would thus, in relation to their astral body and their “I,” be placed in conflict with the world, and instead of receiving organs through which he could gradually shed light on this spiritual world, he would be shattered by the influences of the spiritual world; he would not experience these influences as something that fosters him or enriches him, but as something that hinders his thinking.

[ 11 ] Since we will have a great need for this concept in the coming days, I ask you to bear in mind that we are at a point here where we can realize that something that exists in the external world—and we are now speaking of the spiritual external world—can be highly beneficial to a person and, conversely, highly inhibiting, depending on how they relate their own being to this external world. Let us imagine a person with an astral body that is not properly developed exposing themselves to the spiritual environment. This environment affects them. Whereas, if they had developed the proper organs, this spiritual environment would flow into them, enriching them with the mysteries of the world, this very same external world will cause them to wither spiritually if their organs are poorly developed. It is the same external world that at one time lifts a person to the highest heights and at another time holds them back; the same external world of which a person will one day say, “It is a divine, nurturing world,” if they themselves possess what is right within; and of which they will say, “It is a world of obstacles,” if they themselves possess an inner being that is not properly developed. In these words lies much of the key to understanding what is good and fruitful, and what is evil and destructive in the world. And from this you can see that the effect that certain entities in the environment have on us is not decisive for the nature of this world itself. Depending on how we face the outside world, the same entity may at times be beneficial or hindering; the same entity can be God or the devil for our spiritual organization. I ask you to keep this firmly in mind, for we will need it for various reasons in the coming days.

[ 12 ] We have thus examined the nature of preparation for clairvoyant research as it relates to the astral body and the “I.” And we have had to emphasize that we humans are, in a certain sense, in a fortunate position, because at least for a certain period during a twenty-four-hour period, we have the subtle astral body and the “I” separate from the physical body and the etheric body. The etheric body, however, does not separate from the physical body even at night; it remains connected to the physical body. We know, of course, from the various lectures that have been given here for years now, that it is only at death that the moment occurs when the physical human body remains on its own and the etheric body, together with the astral body and the “I,” lifts itself out of the physical body. We need not mention today the path these three aspects of human nature subsequently undergo between death and a new birth; we simply wish to make it clear to the soul that with death comes the moment when the human being is free from the physical body and from everything that is built into this physical body—free, therefore, from the physical sense organs, free from the brain, the instrument of the physically active intellect. There, in their proper way, the I, the astral body, and the etheric body are united; there they can interact. Therefore, with regard to the previous life, a state of true clairvoyance sets in from the moment of death, even if initially only for a short time. This has been mentioned frequently in these lectures. For such a cooperation—as can normally occur only at the moment of death—the “I,” the astral body, and the etheric body must be given the opportunity to work together in order to bring about complete clairvoyance. The etheric body must therefore be able to free itself from the state into which it is confined during normal life; it must also be able to make use of its elasticity and become independent of the elasticity of the physical body, just as the astral body is at night. To this end, higher, more intense, and more strenuous exercises are necessary in a certain sense. All of this can, of course, be touched upon in the coming days in the appropriate contexts; but today let us make it clear to ourselves that this is necessary. It is not yet enough for a person to have performed those preparatory exercises that continue to work into the astral body to develop the spiritual eyes and ears; rather, exercises are also necessary that give the etheric body independence and freedom from the physical body. Today, however, let us consider, in a certain sense, the result that must then follow. You can, in fact, already deduce this from what has been said.

[ 13 ] We can say that normally it is only at the moment of death that the possibility arises for the “I,” the astral body, and the etheric body to interact freely, unbound by the physical body. For clairvoyant research, therefore, something must occur that can be compared solely to what otherwise happens to a person at the moment of death, that is, if a person wishes to become clairvoyant in the conscious sense, they must reach a stage of development in their life where they are just as independent of their physical body and the use of its limbs as they are of them at the moment of death.

[ 14 ] We ask ourselves: by what means can a human being—let us answer this question today in the abstract; in the coming days we will address it in the concrete—attain such independence from the physical body, and by what means can he place himself in a state that, in terms of consciousness, resembles the moment of physical death? The only way they can place themselves in such a state is by developing certain sensations and nuances of sensation that so move the soul that, in a certain sense, these sensations and nuances of sensation, through their power, seize the etheric body and lift it out of the physical body. Thus, impulses of sensation, thought, and will must be at work in the soul with such intensity that an inner force arises which frees the etheric body from the physical body for a few moments. But such a thing cannot be brought about through external physical measures in our present stage of human development. Anyone who believes that such things can be brought about through physical means would be succumbing to a tremendous delusion. They would want to enter the spiritual worlds while still clinging to the manipulations and facts of the physical world—in other words, they would not yet have attained a genuine belief in the power of the spiritual worlds. It must be solely inner processes—processes of a strong, energetic soul life—that bring about this state. ^{4In all these descriptions, it must be clearly understood that they refer only to soul processes that have as little to do with a transition into the pathological-organic realm as mathematical formulations do, and which, nevertheless, are not merely of a formal nature like the latter, but correspond to a spiritual reality. They relate to ordinary clairvoyance as the positive relates to the negative.} And if we remain in the abstract, we can tentatively say today: the most essential factor in bringing about such a state is that the human being experiences a transformation—as it were, a reversal—of their sphere of interest. In ordinary life, a person is endowed with certain interests. You know that these interests are at play from morning to night. A person—and they are quite right to do so, for they must live in this world—is interested in what appeals to their eyes, their ears, their physical intellect, their physical sensations, and so on; they are interested in what they encounter in the external world; they have more interest in one thing than in another; they devote more attention to one thing than to another; that is only natural. And in these ebbing and flowing interests, which bind them with certain forces of attraction to the fabric of the external world, people live—indeed, the vast majority of people today live—entirely alone.

[ 15 ] There is only one way for a person to bring about moments in life—without compromising the freshness and vitality of these external interests—in which these external interests have no effect at all; in which, to put it bluntly, the entire external sensory world becomes absolutely indifferent to him; in which he extinguishes all the forces of interest that bind him to this or that in the sensory world. It would be wrong for a person not to reserve this extinguishing of interest in the external world for certain festive moments in life, but rather to extend it to his entire life. Such a person would become incapable of participating in the external world; yet we are called to participate in the external world and its work throughout our lives. We must therefore reserve and save for special moments the ability to let all external interests in the world around us die within us, and we must, so to speak, master this dual nature so that, on the one hand, we are able to participate vividly and freshly in everything that unfolds out there—joy and pain, pleasure and displeasure, life in bloom, sprouting, and withering—and so that we can combine these with our other interests. We must keep alive the freshness and originality of our interest in the outside world throughout our earthly life; we must not become strangers on earth, for then we would act solely out of selfishness and would rob the arena to which our energies are meant to be devoted within our present stage of development of our strength. But on the other hand, in order to ascend to the higher worlds, we must cultivate the other aspect of nature, which consists in putting to rest—allowing to wither away—our interests in the external world during the festive moments of life. And if we have the patience and perseverance, the energy and strength, for as long as our karma requires us to practice this letting go of interest in our surroundings—if we practice this sufficiently—then ultimately, through this letting go of interest in the outside world, a strong, energetic force will be released within us. What we let go of in the outside world in this way comes to life to a greater degree in the inner world. We experience an entirely new kind of life; we go through that moment when we can say to ourselves: what we can see with our eyes and hear with our ears is, after all, only a part of life as a whole. There is a completely different life, a life in the spiritual world; a resurrection in the spiritual world, a stepping beyond what is otherwise called life—a stepping beyond such that death does not occur, but rather a higher life results.

[ 16 ] Once this purely spiritual force within us has become strong enough, we can gradually experience moments when we become rulers and masters of our etheric body—moments when this etheric body does not assume the form imposed on it by the tensile forces of the lungs and liver, but rather the form we impose on it from above through our astral body. Then we impress upon our etheric body the form that we have first imprinted on the astral body through meditation, concentration, and so on; then we imprint the plastic form of the astral body onto the etheric body, and we ascend from the preparation for enlightenment to the next stage of clairvoyant research. The first stage, through which we transform our astral body so that it acquires organs, is also called purification or refinement, because this astral body is cleansed of the forces of the external world and submits to inner forces. The stage, however, at which this astral body succeeds in imprinting its form upon the etheric body is associated with the fact that it becomes spiritually bright around us, that the spiritual world around us becomes manifest, and that enlightenment sets in.

[ 17 ] What I have just described to you is connected with certain experiences that a person goes through—experiences that are typical, that are the same for everyone, and that everyone who walks this path experiences at the moment when they are ready for it and when they direct the necessary attention to certain things and processes that lie beyond the sensory realm. The first experience that arises through the organization of the astral body—that is, as a result of meditation, concentration, and so on—could be described as an emotional or sensory experience, an experience that, if one were to describe it, could best be characterized as a fully conscious internal division of our entire personality. ^{5One must strictly distinguish what is described here as a “splitting of the personality” from what is meant by this term—or by “double ego”—by those thinkers who view it as something pathological or dreamlike. The split characterized here takes place with full composure solely within the soul; it is so thoroughly understood that a clear, conscious presence within the ordinary “I” is in no way impaired. This “I” loses none of its inner strength and integrity in the process.} At the moment one experiences this, one says to oneself: Now you have actually become something like two personalities; you are, as it were, like a sword sheathed in its scabbard. Before, you could have compared yourself to a sword that is not sheathed, but rather is forged as one with its scabbard, consisting of a single piece; you felt yourself to be a unity with your physical body; but now it is as if, although you are housed within your physical body like the sword in its sheath, you are nevertheless a being who feels itself to be something outside the sheath of the physical body in which it is housed. - One does indeed feel oneself to be within one’s physical body, but not fused with it, not consisting of a single piece with it. This inner liberation, this inner sense of being a second personality that has emerged from the first—that is the great experience on the path to clairvoyant perception of the world. It must therefore be emphasized that this first experience is a sensory experience, an emotional experience. One must feel this being enclosed within one’s old personality and yet, at the same time, feel free and mobile within it. Of course, this is only a comparison—that of a sword and its sheath. For the sword feels constrained on all sides by the walls of its sheath; but the person who has this sensation experiences a profound sense of inner mobility, as if at every point they could break through the boundaries of their physical body, could emerge, could make forays through the skin of their physical body, could extend spiritual antennae into a world that is still dark to them, but which is becoming perceptible and, in the darkness —- one might say — becomes palpable and recognizable. This is the first great experience a person has.

[ 18 ] The second aspect is that the second personality, which is contained within the first, gradually acquires the ability to truly step out of this first personality in a soul-spiritual sense. This experience is already expressed by the fact that the person now has the experience—albeit often only for a short time—of seeing himself, as if he were facing his own doppelgänger, so to speak. This second experience, however, has much greater significance than the first. For linked to this second experience is something that—one might say—is very difficult for a person to bear. One must bear in mind that in normal life, a person is contained within their physical body. What is contained within it is the astral body and the “I,” and what is thus contained within the physical body as the astral body and the “I” adapts itself to the forces of the physical body; it nestles within it, so to speak. It takes on the form of the liver, the form of the heart, the form of the physical brain, and so on. And so it is also with the etheric body, as long as it is contained within the physical body. It takes on the form of the physical brain, the form of the heart, and so on. Consider what is meant by the terms “brain,” “heart,” and so on—what marvelous, self-contained instruments and organs they are, what marvelous, self-contained creations. Let us ask ourselves what all human art and all human creation amount to in comparison to that creation, to that art and technology that are necessary to construct such marvelous instruments as the heart, the brain, and so on. What can human beings, at their present stage of development, achieve in art and technology compared to that divine art and divine technology that built our physical body—and that therefore also protects us as long as we are housed within the physical body? Thus, in our daily lives, we are, together with our physical body, entrusted to divine creation. Our etheric body and our astral body are fitted into forms created by the gods. But when we become free and independent, the situation changes. Then we simultaneously free ourselves from the marvels of divine creation. We do not, therefore, leave the physical body as something we may look down upon as imperfect, but rather as the temple the gods have built for us, in which we otherwise dwell during our waking lives. What are we then?

[ 19 ] Let us suppose for a moment that we could leave this physical body at any moment without further preparation; that some magician would help us to leave this physical body, so that it remains alone, so that the etheric body accompanies the astral body, so that we thus, in a certain sense, go through an experience comparable to the moment of death. Let us assume we could do this without the preparation we have spoken of: what are we then, once we are out there, when we face ourselves? There we are what we have become in the course of world evolution, from life to life. As long as we are confined to the physical body from morning to evening, the divine creation of the temple that is our physical body corrects what we have organized within ourselves from incarnation to incarnation in the course of our earthly life; but now, when we step out, our astral body and our etheric body possess what they have acquired from life to life without correction; now they appear as they must, according to what they have made of themselves. When a person steps out of their physical body in such an unprepared state, they are not a being of a higher, nobler, or purer form than the one they possessed in the physical body, but rather a being with all the imperfections they have accumulated in their karma. All of this remains invisible as long as the physical body houses our etheric body, astral body, and ego. It becomes visible the moment we step out of the physical body with the higher aspects of our being. If we become clairvoyant at that very moment, we see before our eyes all the inclinations and passions we still carry over from what we were in previous earthly lives. Let us suppose that, in the course of future earthly lives, we will still go through many more; there we will do this or that, accomplish this or that. For many of the things we will accomplish, the inclinations, drives, and passions are already present now; we have developed them through incarnations in earlier times. Everything a person is capable of accomplishing in this or that aspect of the world, everything of which they have made themselves guilty toward this or that person—what they will have to atone for toward this or that person in the future—all of this is embodied in the astral and etheric bodies when they step out of the physical body. We encounter ourselves, as it were, soul- and spirit-naked, when we are clairvoyant at the moment of stepping out; that is to say, we stand before our inner eye in such a way that we now know how much worse off we are than we would be had we attained that perfection which the gods possessed, enabling them to create the marvelous structure of our physical body. At that moment, we see how far we fall short of that perfection which must serve as our future ideal of development. At that moment, we know how far we have descended below the world of perfection.

[ 20 ] This is the experience associated with enlightenment; this is the experience known as the encounter with the Keeper of the Threshold. That which is real does not become any more or any less real simply because we see it or do not see it. The figure we see at that moment, as just described, is also present at other times; it is, in fact, always within us; but because we have not yet stepped outside ourselves—because we are not facing ourselves, but are instead trapped inside—we do not see it. In ordinary life, what we see at the moment when we step out of ourselves through clairvoyance is the Keeper of the Threshold. He protects us from that experience, which we must first learn to endure. We must first possess that strong inner force that enables us to say to ourselves: A world of the future lies before us, and we look upon what we have become without fear or dread, for we know with absolute certainty that we can make amends for all of it. — The ability we must possess to experience this moment without being overwhelmed by it—we must acquire this ability during our preparation for clairvoyant research. This preparation consists in—again, we are speaking in abstract terms today, we will have to address the concrete aspects later—in strengthening and energizing, in particular, the active, positive qualities of our soul; in increasing our courage, our sense of freedom, our love, our energy of thought, and our energy of clear-sighted intellect as much as we possibly can, so that we step out of our physical body not as weak but as strong human beings. But if there is too much of what is commonly known in everyday life as anxiety and fear within a person, they will not be able to survive this experience without feeling oppressed.

[ 21 ] Thus one sees that there are certain conditions for gaining insight into the spiritual worlds, which, in a certain sense, hold out the prospect of the highest conceivable goal for the life of humanity in its present stage of development, and which at the same time require that the human being achieve a complete transformation and reversal of his being for the moments of celebration. The greatest benefit in our time today is bestowed upon those who, before proceeding to this experience, allow themselves to be told what those who have experienced the higher worlds have beheld; what, when recounted, can be grasped and understood without one’s own direct insight into these worlds. Research is possible only if one looks into these realms oneself. But by striving more and more to grasp with the intellect what the clairvoyant researcher says, one comes more and more to say to oneself: When I consider all that life brings, I must say that the results of supersensible research are, after all, quite reasonable. If one strives first to gain an overview in this way—if one seeks first to become a thinker and then a clairvoyant—then one has done the right thing with regard to humanity’s present stage of development. First, one must thoroughly familiarize oneself with spiritual science. If one does this, then the great, comprehensive, strengthening, inspiring, and refreshing ideas and thoughts of this science do not merely provide the soul with theory; they endow the soul with qualities of feeling, will, and thought, so that it is steeled. Then, once the soul has undergone this process, the moment of encounter with the Keeper of the Threshold becomes something different from what it would otherwise have been. Fear and anxiety are overcome in a completely different way when one has first passed through the process of grasping the narratives of the higher worlds than when this has not happened.

[ 22 ] But once a person has had this experience—of confronting oneself, that is, of encountering the Guardian of the Threshold—the world begins to take on a completely different character for them; then, in a certain sense, all things in the world take on a new form. And the judgment is justified that goes something like this: Until now, I have known what fire is; but that was only an illusion; for what I have hitherto called fire bears to its reality—to what I now know as fire—roughly the same relationship as if I were to regard the impressions left by the wheels of a carriage on the road as the sole reality, and were unwilling to admit to myself: a carriage must have driven over there, with a person sitting in it. I say of these ruts that they are the signs, the outward expression, of the carriage that drove over them and in which a person was sitting. Once it has passed by, I see nothing of it; yet it is the cause of the ruts; it is the essence. And anyone who were to believe that the ruts left by the wheels are something self-contained, something essential, would regard the outward impression as the thing itself. — Thus, what we see in external life as the blazing fire is, in relation to its reality—to the spiritual essence that lies behind it—like the ruts in the road are to the person who was sitting in the carriage that drove down the road. In the fire, we have only an external expression. Behind what the eye sees as fire and what we perceive as warmth lies the true spiritual essence, which finds its outward expression only in the external fire. Behind what we breathe in as air, behind what enters the eye as light, behind what is sound in our ears—behind all of these lie the active divine-spiritual entities, which have, as it were, only their outer garment in fire, in water, and in that which surrounds us in the various realms of the world.

[ 23 ] In what is known as the “Esoteric Teaching,” or the “Teaching of the Mysteries,” this experience—which one has in this way—is called “passing through the elemental worlds.” Whereas one previously held the belief that what one recognizes as fire is a reality, one now experiences that behind the fire there are living beings. One becomes acquainted, so to speak—more or less intimately acquainted—with fire as something entirely different from how it appears in the sensory world; one becomes acquainted with the fire beings, with that which stands behind the fire as a soul. Just as our soul stands behind our body, so the soul and spirit of fire stand behind the fire that is perceptible to the outer senses. One enters a spiritual realm when one experiences the soul and spirit of fire; and this experience—which tells us: the outer fire is not the truth, it is mere illusion, a mere garment; I am now among the fire gods, just as I was previously among human beings in the physical world—this experience is called “life in the element of fire,” to speak in the sense of esoteric science. The same is true of what we breathe in. At the moment when what we breathe in as external air becomes merely the garment for the living beings lying behind it, we are living in the element of air.

[ 24 ] And so, once a person has passed through the encounter with the Guardian of the Threshold, they can ascend to the experience of the beings in the so-called elements—the elements of fire, water, air, and earth. These four kinds of spirits that dwell in the elements do exist, and the human being who has reached the stage just described interacts with the spiritual beings of the elements. They live within the elements; they experience earth, water, air, and fire. What we ordinarily refer to by these terms in everyday life is merely the outer garment, the outer expression of the spiritual beings that lie behind them. Certain divine-spiritual beings, therefore, dwell in what appears to us as solid matter or earth—in the spiritual-scientific sense—as liquid matter or water—in the spiritual-scientific sense—as expansive matter or air, and as warm, fiery matter or fire. But these are not yet the highest spiritual beings; rather, once we have worked our way through the experience of the elemental world, we ascend to those beings who are the creative forces for the spirits that live within the elements. And now consider the following: When one observes one’s surroundings—the physical environment—one sees that they consist of what are the four outer members of the actual elemental world. Whether one sees plants, animals, or stones on the physical plane, one can say: they consist either of the solid—that is, the earthy—in esoteric terms, or of the liquid—that is, the watery—in esoteric terms, of the gaseous—that is, the airy—and of the fiery—the warm. These are the elements from which the things physically present in the mineral, plant, animal, and human worlds are composed. And as creative forces, as life-giving forces, behind what is physical lie those forces that flow to us for the most part from the sun. The sun, after all, brings forth from the earth the sprouting, budding life. The sun, then, sends those forces—in the physical sense, first and foremost—to the earth, which make it possible to perceive with the physical senses what lives in fire, air, water, and earth. We see the sun physically because it physically radiates light. Physical light is obstructed by physical matter. Human beings see the sun from sunrise to sunset, and they do not see the sun when physical earthly matter obscures it; from sunset to sunrise, they do not see it. Such darkness as prevails in physical life from sunset to sunrise—such darkness does not exist in the spiritual world. At the very moment when the clairvoyant has attained what has been described—at the moment when he beholds, behind fire, the spirits of fire; behind air, the spirits of air; behind water the spirits of water, and behind the earth the spirits of the earth—at that very moment he sees, behind these spiritual beings, their higher rulers, their higher guides: that which relates to these elemental beings just as the warming, illuminating, and beneficent sun relates to the sprouting and growing physical life on our earth. That is to say, the clairvoyant forces himself to move from the contemplation of the elemental beings to the contemplation of the higher spiritual beings, which are in the spiritual realm roughly what, in the physical realm, can be symbolically compared to the sun in relation to the Earth. The human being then sees, behind the elemental beings, a high spiritual world: the spiritual sun. When, for the clairvoyant, that which is otherwise darkness becomes light—when he attains enlightenment—then, then he advances, just as the physical eye advances toward the sun, toward the spiritual sun, that is, toward the spiritual beings. And when does he advance toward these higher spiritual beings? He advances when, so to speak, spiritual darkness is at its peak for human beings. When a person is otherwise free with regard to their astral body and their ego—that is, from the moment they fall asleep until the moment they wake up—they live surrounded by darkness, because they do not see the spiritual world that then surrounds them. This darkness gradually increases, reaches a peak, and then diminishes again until morning, when they wake up. It reaches, so to speak, a peak. One can compare this peak of spiritual darkness to what in external life is called midnight. Just as external physical darkness is normally at its strongest at this time—increasing until then and then diminishing afterward—so too, with regard to spiritual darkness, there is a peak, a “midnight.” At a certain level of clairvoyance, it is the case that during the time when spiritual darkness is rising for the person lacking spiritual perception, one sees the elemental spirits; the same is true as the darkness recedes. If one has reached only a lower level of clairvoyance, it is the case that one first experiences, so to speak, certain elemental spirits; but just when one wishes to experience the highest spiritual moment—the hour of midnight—a further eclipse occurs, and only then does an illumination follow. But once one has reached a certain level of clairvoyance, what might be called the “midnight hour” becomes all the brighter. During this time ^{6One must be clear that this “midnight hour” does not refer to a moment coinciding with the external passage of time, but rather to an inner state.} one experiences the vision of those spiritual beings who, in relation to the elemental spirits, are like the Sun to the physical Earth; one experiences the higher, creative, solar beings, and that moment occurs which is technically called “seeing the Sun at midnight.”

[ 25 ] These, then, are the stages that must be lived through today—as at all times—by anyone who wishes to rise to the level of clairvoyant research, who wishes to look beyond the veil that shrouds the true world within the earthly elements. These stages, which have now been described—the feeling of freedom in relation to one’s second personality, like a sword in its sheath; this feeling of being outside the physical body, as if one had drawn the sword from its sheath; the encounter with the Keeper of the Threshold; the experience of the elemental beings—that is, the experience of that great moment when the fire, air, water, and earth beings become beings among whom one walks, with whom one now interacts just as one does with human beings in ordinary life; and then the experience of that moment when one encounters the primordial being of these elemental beings—these are the stages that could be passed through at any time, that can still be passed through today; these are—this has often been described in other ways, for they can be described in many different ways, and it always remains only an imperfect description! —the stages that lead upward into the spiritual worlds. We had to bring them before our soul to see what a person must do for themselves at any time in order to recognize the spiritual beings. And we will now have to continue bringing before our soul what a person experiences in these spiritual worlds; we will have to bring before our soul some of the concrete tasks that a person must undertake in order to encounter the spiritual beings. And once we have brought this matter before our soul in the way that can be achieved through Western initiation, we will then compare what we have thus gained from the matter itself with what has been passed down to humanity through Eastern tradition and ancient wisdom. This is what can be understood as the shedding of the Christ-light upon the wisdom of pre-Christian times.